1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the mounting of tiltable ornaments or emblems on motor vehicles.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A known tiltable ornament is mounted on the front of a motor vehicle and adapted to be tilted in the event of an impact so that injury to a part of a person or object striking the ornament is prevented.
A typical example of such tiltable ornament and its mounting is shown in FIG. 1 and will be described hereinbelow.
In the drawing, a hood of a passenger car is generally indicated at 10 and formed from an outer hood panel 10a and an inner hood panel 10b. On the inner hood panel 10b a striker 12 is mounted which constitutes part of a hood locking mechanism. A tiltable ornament assembly is generally indicated at 14 and comprises an ornament 16 and a base 18. The base 18 is provided with a sleeve-like downward extension 18a receiving therein a coil spring 20. The upper end of the coil spring 20 is seated on an inner shoulder of the extension 18a, whilst the lower end projects downwardly from the extension 18a and is seated on the bent or hooked lower end of a split pin 22. The split pin 22 extends upwardly from the hooked lower end thereof through the coil spring 20 and is anchored at the upper end thereof to the pedestal portion 16a of the ornament 16 whose sole is received in the correspondingly shaped seating of the base 18. In this manner, the spring 20 is arranged in a compressed state. By the foregoing, the ornament 16 is rockably and displaceably mounted on the base 18.
The base 18 thus assembled with the ornament 16 is mounted on the hood 10 with the following structure. This is, the upper hood panel 10a is formed with a flanged opening 10c. The base 18 is placed on the outer hood panel 10a by interposing therebetween a resilient base pad 24, with the downward extension 18a of the base 18 being inserted into the opening 10c. The extension 18a of the base 18 is threaded to receive a nut 26, and interposed between the nut 26 and the inner face of the outer hood panel 10a is a spacer 28 surrounding part of the extension 18a. The spacer 28 is pushed against the inner face of the outer panel 10a when the nut 26 is tightened with a suitable tool such as a socket wrench 30. By tightening the nut 26 properly, the base 12 is rigidly secured to the hood 10.
The above described ornament assembly has the disadvantage that it requires a difficult assembling work since the installation of the base 18 requires a mechanic to work from the outside of the hood 10 for placing and holding the base 18 on the hood 10 simultaneously with to work from the inside of the hood 10 for fastening the base 18 with the nut 26 and the spacer 28. The ornament assembly is further disadvantageous since it requires in the inner hood panel 10b a hole allowing a mechanic to reach to the inside of the outer hood panel 10a, causing various restrictions in design of ornament and hood. For example, the undesirable inclination of the extension 18a of the base 18 and the complicated shape of the spacer 28 in the illustrated structure were resulted from such restrictions.